Enigmatic Variations No. 1715: The Wrong Sort by Wicksparrow

We have the WRONG SORT of something from Wicksparrow this week…maybe it was the wrong sort of week for my blogging turn to fall?!

The preamble (which needed a couple of re-reads!) states that:

“In 36 clues, an extra word must be removed before solving. Of the first letters of these, in clue order, 18 spell the name of a writer (Set W) and the rest give a cryptic representation of the title (Set T) of one of his works. A six-word phrase from the work (cited on Wikiquote) must be illustrated by completing 1a (two words) and 42a (three words). The latter is THE WRONG SORT and must be corrected, always leaving real crossing words. For a similar error in Set T, solvers must change two unchecked letters in one entry to produce the correct word (6). All unchecked letters in these three thematic entries, both before and after changes, could spell I DISMISS AI PRIZE GOAL. Finally, solvers must highlight three examples of 1a (19 cells). Chambers Dictionary (2016) is recommended.”

Now, I am familiar with Wickball as a setter, and also with Hedgesparrow…so my money is on this being a collaboration between the two. Usually devious enough on their own, will they be twice as devious together? That long and convoluted preamble doesn’t dispel any fears along those lines.

The only thing to do was to dive in and start solving, and I did make fairly good progress, with some of those extra words being relatively easy to spot and wheedle out. However, it turned out that filling the grid was only half the battle!

I initially expected that the 18 of Set W and the 18 of Set T would be one after the other, but once I had a few initials that idea was soon shot down. I then wondered if one was contained within the other, but again that seemed to be impractical once I had enough letters. So I eventually realised that they were probably intertwined, but not just alternately.

Cue a period of time trying to untangle the letters I had, and after many permutations I managed to see the letters of SIR TERENCE RATTIGAN as a possible Set W. The rest made no sense at all, so I resorted to a little wiki-oogling of his works, of which FRENCH WITHOUT TEARS seemed to be quite prominent.

More time passed until I worked out that the the other letters, Set T, formed FRANCAIS (French) around (without, or rather outwith) DECHIRURES (tears, of the ripping kind, rather than crying). The French connection helped the top row become DES INSPIRATIONS, and the quote started to have to be ‘(she has) ideas above her station‘, or ‘(elle a) des idées au-dessus de sa gare‘.

Which meant that the ideas could be ‘des inspirations’ and the bottom row could be a station – GARE SAINT LAZARE – which was vaguely familiar.

So far, so ‘bien’, but what could the ‘wrong sort’ of station be? I spent a while convinced that, because Gare St Lazare is a mainline/above-ground station, maybe the alternative was a Métro/underground station…cue much staring at a Metro map, trying to find 15-letter station names in the region of St Lazare.

At some point I also considered the wrongness in Set T – dechirures are tears as in rips, whereas tears that are cried are LARMES, and the only entry two letters away from that was LARDER.

So now I had most of the unchecked letters referred to towards the end of the preamble, and I tried subtracting them from the given phrase to give candidates for the bottom row. I didn’t help myself by doing this wrongly two or three times, but I eventually worked out that they had to be P,I,I,O,I, and that, along with the possible alternative endings of Down crossers (and the liberal use of a pattern matcher!), helped me to finally derive POSITION,,,,and, some while later, SOCIALE.

So the correct ‘station’ is POSITION SOCIALE, the correct ‘tears’ are LARMES, and I almost forgot to look for the three examples of those ‘idées’: NOTION, THEORIE et PENSÉE:

 

 

Wow – that was a tough workout, which needed almost every one of the 10 days or so that we have to solve and submit an EV these days – 9am on the second Wednesday after publication, and my entry was e-submitted at 08.53!

[I happened to bump into the EV editor at the after-drinks for the Times Champs, in the George on Southwark Street, and he confirmed my suspicion of the collaborative pairing, and he also confided that this was probably one of the toughest EVs in recent years…which was both reassuring, in justifying the time it was taking me, and worrying, in that I was already nearly a week in and still some way away from working out the final dénouement!]

So, half-a-thank-you each to Wickball and Hedgesparrow, and half a chapeau to each for an impressive puzzle, device/treatment and grid construction, with symmetry maintained throughout. If either/both of you are at the York get-together next week, you each can buy me half a pint to compensate for the stress of the last 10 days!

(I trust all is clear above and below, but I has been a bit of a rush to finish this before publication deadline…I only just parsed GRIPE at the last minute – was about to issue a pleas for help via the comments…)

 

Across
Clue No	Extra word	Set W	Set T	Solution / Entry	Clue (definition underlined, extra word in bold) Logic/Parsing
11	FLOODED		F	DENE	Flooded valley circled by golden eagle (4) hidden word in, i.e. circled by, ‘golDEN Eagle’
12	SISTERS	S		PINOT	Sisters actively opt to drink fashionable wine (5) P_OT (anag, i.e. actively, of OPT) around (drinking) IN (fashionable)
14	ROMAN		R	IONIC	One working Roman in charge of some old Greeks (5) I (one) + ON (working) + IC (in charge)
16	INQUIETUDE	I		LARDER / LARMES	Doctor gripped by genuine inquietude over stock of provisions (6) RE_AL (genuine) around (gripping) DR (doctor) = REDRAL, turned over to give LARDER
17	REFUSAL	R		BEGO	Beset once by every refusal originally, then success (4) BE (origins, or first letters, of By Every) + GO (success, make a go of it)
19				TITHE	Article about sex for small payment (5) T_HE (definite article) around IT (euphemism for you know, whatsit, how’s yer father, S-E-X!)
20	ASSEMBLY		A	ORIEL	Bay window framed by angle iron assembly, looking west (5) reversed hidden word, i.e. framed by and heading west, in ‘angLE IROn’
21	NEEDLING		N	IZARD	Perhaps gecko’s left off needling chamois (5) (L)IZARD, perhaps a gecko, losing L – left, off
23	TURNING	T		STEER	Control the course of horse, abruptly turning right (5) STEE(D) (horse, abruptly, or short of last letter) + R (right)
25	DIVING		D	FINALE	Penalty stopped by Al diving in the end (6) FIN_E (penalty) around (stopped by) AL
27				TAENIA	Headband isn’t commonly worn by each revolutionary (6) AIN_T (isn’t, in common vernacular) around EA (each), all revolved, or revolutionary, to give TAENIA
28	ENDLESSLY	E		OPENS	Writes endlessly after nothing starts (5) O (zero, nothing) + PENS (writes)
30				EDGAR	Spearman of staggering grade (5) The name EDGAR means ‘wealthy spearman’
31	EVENTS		E	IGBOS	Changing events, so big for many in 10 (5) anag, i.e. changing, of SO BIG
33	RADICAL	R		ALTAR	On hearing radical change, one could be high (5) homophone, i.e. on hearing – ALTER (change) can sound like ALTAR (church furniture, of which the principal one is the high altar)
36	EASY	E		NAAN	Either way, it’s easy bread (4) palindromic CD – whichever way you read it, NAAN is NAAN
38	CAUGHT		C	BASSET	Hound beasts caught in confusion (6) anag, i.e. in confusion, of BEASTS
39	NERVOUSLY	N		GRIPE	Taking 12, say, one nervously conceals a bellyache (5) GR(A)PE (12A, Pinot, a wine grape) with I (one) replacing, or concealing A = GRIPE
40	HACKNEY		H	STOEP	Hackney poet’s recreated East London verandah (5) anag, i.e. recreated, of POETS [East London in South Africa, not the Great Wen of London]
41	CRITICAL	C		RITE	Naked author’s critical initiation (4) (W)RITE(R) – author, with outer letters removed, so naked!
Clue No	Extra word	Set W	Set T	Solution / Entry	Clue (definition underlined, extra word in bold) Logic/Parsing
1				DULCIFYING	Public tiff regularly seen in passing is rarely sweetening (10) D_YING (passing) around ULCIF (regular letters seen in ‘pUbLiC tIfF’
2	INNOVATIVE		I	EDAM	Innovative dairy product caused upset (4) MADE, or caused, upset = EDAM 9cheese, dairy product)
3	ROOMS		R	SERVANT	Housemaid is one preparing tavern’s rooms (7) anag, i.e. preparing, of TAVERNS
4	ELDERS	E		NEEP	Elders for the most part want positive Highland crop (4) NEE(D) (want, for the most part) + P (positive)
5	RECIPE	R		PIPIS	Greek character repeatedly first to sample shellfish recipe (5) PIPI (pi, Greek character, repeated) + S (first letter of Sample)
6				INATTENTION	Lack of concentration perceived as internal stress? (11) homophone, i.e. perceived – INATTENTION (lack of concentration) can sound like INNER TENSION (internal stress!)
7	UNDER		U	ROCHET	Shedding tears sadly, orchestrate changes under bishop’s attire (6) subtractive anag, i.e. changes, of ORCHE(S)T(RATE) minus the mixed up, or sad, letters of TEARS
8	ANCIENT	A		TIRO	Novice takes in ancient Rome only at first (4) first letters of ‘Takes In (Ancient) Rome Only’
9	RATTED		R	ONE	Opera company turned up ratted? It’s a joke! (3) ENO (English National Opera) turned up = ONE (a joke, as in ‘have you heard the one about the …’)
10	ERITREAN		E	NIGERIA	Song, say, in Eritrean, recalled African land (7) AIR (song, tune) + EG (for example, say) + IN, all recalled to give NIGERIA (African land)
13	TEASES	T		TWEETER	Texter teases speaker (7) double defn. – someone sending some text might be a TWEETER; and a TWEETER is a loudspeaker used for higher frequencies)
15	SPACE		S	COLLARETTE	Clear space to let out small neck of garment (10) anag, i.e. out, of CLEAR TO LET
17	TAKING	T		BREEDS	Races about, taking in one of the Home Counties (6) B_EDS (Bedfordshire, one of the ‘Home Counties’ around London) around RE (about)
18	CONFRONTS		C	DRAGON	Academic holding rough hard stone confronts fearsome beast (6) D_ON (academic) around (holding) RAG (rough hard stone)
19	INTELLECTUALS	I		TREPANS	Bores pants off intellectuals, including engineers (7) T_PANS (anag, i.e. off, of PANTS) around (including) RE (Royal Engineers)
22				ZINGARA / ZINGARO	Never-ending Niagara Falls overseen by unknown gypsy (7) Z (unknown, in maths/physics) above, or overseeing (for a Down clue) INGARA (anag, i.e. falls, of most of NIAGAR(A), i.e. neverendingly)
24	GRACE	G		INGESTA	Said grace jokingly before nourishment (7) INGEST (homophone, i.e. said – INGEST can sound like IN JEST, or jokingly) + A (ante, before)
26	ARRIVAL		A	GELATI / GELATO	Cold treats are pinched by Italian on arrival from the South (6) IT (Italian) + LEG (on, one side of a cricket field, from the batter’s point of view) around A (are, metric measure of area), all reversed, or from the South, to give GELATI
29	INOFFENSIVE		I	SALET / SALES	Helmet small inoffensive Celt bears unevenly (5) odd, or uneven, letters borne by ‘SmAlL cElT’
32				SUES / SUET	Follows aged suspects abandoning steamship (4) SU(SS)ES – suspects, abandoning SS – steamship [sue has an archaic meaning as follow, or pursue]
34	ALICE	A		MARA / MARC	Alice about to follow March hare in Patagonia (4) MAR (March) + A (about)
35	NOT	N		PEER / PEEL	Nobleman – not an equal (4) double defn. – a PEER can be a nobleman; and a PEER can be an equal
37	STAYING		S	AIR / AIS	Staying dry, islander initially enters barn unprotected (3) (B)A_R(N) (barn, losing outer letters, so unprotected) around I (initial letter of Islander)